


even gophers have rainy days

by longneckmfer



Category: The Muppets (2011), The Muppets (TV 2015), The Muppets - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Implied homophobia, Ken (Muppets) - Freeform (mentioned), M/M, Scooter x Walter, Scooter's Mom (Muppets) - Freeform (mentioned), Wooter - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-11
Updated: 2020-12-11
Packaged: 2021-03-11 01:55:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,682
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28017333
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/longneckmfer/pseuds/longneckmfer
Summary: where does overworked stage hand scooter go when his mom's boyfriend is being a dick and he's got a subaru with a full tank of gas? apparently, he goes to the apartment of his co worker who he barely knows.but hey. at least walter was nice enough to let him in.
Relationships: Scooter/Walter (Muppets)
Comments: 10
Kudos: 19





	even gophers have rainy days

**Author's Note:**

> hey everyone!! long time, no see!
> 
> anyway, this is a one-shot featuring the blooming relationship between scooter and walter from the muppets. this is my first time writing them, so if they're written out of character then i'm so sorry gnjigjgh
> 
> // trigger warning!! // : there are mentions of implied homophobia and a sliiiiight mention of physical abuse (a character just asks if another is being abused and the other says no). neither are graphic and there are no slurs, but if those are things that trigger you no matter what, then i completely understand not clicking on this fic. that being said? enjoy!

Of all the things Walter was expecting to be outside his door on a Saturday night, Scooter admittedly wasn’t one of them- and yet, that was exactly what his night had brought him.

Scooter was stood on Walter’s doorstep, a shoddy evergreen coat pulled over his stalky body and crimson red vest. His hands were shaking in his pockets, and the dark shadows of a winter night did nothing to hide the sadness and fatigue splashed across his face.

“Scooter?” Walter asks, quite redundantly given his very clear vision. Scooter gives him a weak smile, nodding his head in response as if Walter was, in fact, asking him his name.

“Hey, Walt…” Scooter replies, trying to suppress the shiver that went through his body. Admittedly, he didn’t have much of a plan when coming here, and had kinda just jumped into his car and drove without any set destination in mind after the hell this night had brought him, but he wasn’t exactly complaining about getting to see Walter outside of a work setting.

“You don’t look so good,” Walter, blindly honest as he was, mowed right past Scooter’s introductions and frowned sympathetically at his friend’s haggard appearance. “Is everything OK?”

“Can I come in for a bit? I just uh...It’s been a _real_ rough night, and I kinda need someone to talk to right now,” Scooter responds lamely with a shrug. “...But if you’re busy then that’s OK. I can just go somewhere else-”

“No, no! Scooter, of course you can come in.” Walter gives him a warm smile as opposed to his perplexed expression from before, moving aside and opening his door wider so that Scooter could comfortably step through. Even though Scooter had to slightly duck his head to enter the house without injury, he still flashed Walter a grateful, more genuine smile.

“Thank you...I’m sorry to drop in on you like this. You probably weren’t expecting anyone…” Scooter says after the silent exchange, looking quite apologetic as Walter gestures for him to sit on the couch.

“It’s OK! I’m happy to have the company,” Walter smiles, cheeks red and expression sheepish as he took in the scattered state of his own apartment. “I just hope you don’t mind the mess. I’m not quite settled in here yet.”

“I don’t mind,” Scooter says earnestly as Walter comes to sit beside him. Walter accidentally knocks his knee into Scooter’s as he adjusts his posture on the couch, but he kindly doesn’t remark on the closeness or the collision despite Walter’s hushed apology (not that he minds the contact, given the fact that Walter was quite warm and smelled oddly like cinnamon). Once Walter’s comfortably sat on the couch, he turns to face Scooter with a concerned but serious look on his face.

“So, you said you wanted to talk about something...is everything OK with you?” Walter wastes no time in asking questions, which was honestly a shame because Scooter had just been about to stall and ask about one of the pictures mounted on Walter’s wall. He sighed.

“...No. Everything isn’t OK with me.” This statement would’ve been fairly obvious to anyone, but Scooter hadn’t allowed himself to say anything like this in forever- not since _Ken_ moved in, not since his sister moved out, and not since he rejoined the Muppets. He needed to verbalize it, to finally say it so that he wasn’t carrying his pent up frustration around like a pebble stuck in a shoe.

Walter’s eyes widened, eyebrows furrowing at the statement. His heart broke for his friend, but he had no words of wisdom to offer in his time of need. He settled for gesturing for Scooter to carry on, and after another sigh, Scooter does.

“...You remember my mom’s boyfriend, right?”

“Ken?”

“Yeah. _Ken_.” It wasn’t lost on Walter that Scooter seemed to grind out _Ken’s_ name through his teeth, almost as if the name physically ailed Scooter to say, but he had always optimistically assumed that it was just a mild distaste- currently, though, that doesn’t seem to be the case.

It’s silent between the two males for a beat, Scooter’s breath slightly ragged from the agitation building in his body as Walter sat next to him floundering for the rights words to say. After a pregnant pause, Walter finally speaks up, a wavering tone in his voice.

“He isn’t like...He’s not _doing_ anything to you, is he…?” Walter unwittingly voices the worries that bloomed in his chest, fiddling with his fingers as he asked. If he was being honest, he was quite terrified of the answer if only for Scooter’s sake, but Scooter thankfully shakes his head as a reply.

“It’s nothing like that,” Scooter assures, and he has a slight urge to pat his frazzled friend on the shoulder in a show of reassurance, but he resolves to keep his hands to himself lest he cross some sort of boundary. “It’s nothing physical or anything, but ever since he met me he’s...kind of never liked me, or how close me and my mom were.”

“How do you know he doesn’t like you?” 

If the ill-phrased question was coming from anyone else, Scooter probably would’ve withdrawn into himself and took it as a dismissal of his problems, but Walter’s big eyes were full of nothing but warmth and concern, and he looked like he genuinely wanted to help- at the very least, he knew Walter wouldn’t laugh at him...

Scooter moves closer, fingers drumming on his thighs as he decides to put his trust in Walter, if only for the night.

“...‘Cause he’s said exactly that- he thinks I’m too nerdy. Too nerdy, too wimpy, too quiet. I’m pretty sure he’s got a list somewhere,” Scooter talks off handedly, as if these are things he’s just gotten used to. Walter frowns at Scooter’s flippant tone, but Scooter just keeps talking. “He’s constantly berating me for the things I like or the people I work with, and he’s constantly acting like he owns the house and like he’s my dad or something, but he never does it when my mom’s in the room…It’s just exhausting to live with him.”

“That’s not cool at all! What gives him the right to say stuff like that about you!?” Walter blanches, not really knowing what to do with himself due to his anger on Scooter’s behalf. 

“Yeah…” Scooter trails off, feeling quite hollow but also quite bashful at Walter’s defense of him.

“Have you told your mom what he says to you? I’m sure she wouldn’t let it keep happening if you told her.” Walter offers. Scooter shakes his head as a reply, a small rueful smile on his face.

“No, I haven’t...I can’t.”

“Why not?”

“He’s really good to my mom, y’know?” When Walter only blinks at him, Scooter sighs and continues. “...She’s been really upset since my dad walked out, and _Ken_ is the first guy in a while to treat her right. He might be a jerk, but he cares about my mom and makes her happy, and I would hate to be the reason she loses all of that.”

“...Oh,” Walter frowns again, lips pursed as Scooter’s words register in his mind. He hadn’t been very close to Scooter before this night (which made it quite odd that out of everyone he knew, Scooter came to him, almost as if some broke 19 year old fanfiction writer forced him to), and he’d had no idea that things got this bad for him, or that he really had no way out except to move out someday. “...I’m so sorry.”

“It’s OK.” Scooter says. Walter wanted to say that it wasn’t, that Scooter shouldn’t have to tolerate this for his mother’s sake and keep working like nothing was wrong, but those words felt too performative, too practiced, so Walter stays silent.

Scooter, however, wasn’t quite done venting.

“...Tonight was the last straw for me...I just had to get out of there, even if it’s only for a while.”

“What happened?”

“...We got into a fight at dinner, a really bad one, and my mom wasn’t there to break it up. I guess I just snapped, since I called him a jerk right to his face and told him that he wasn’t my dad...He said I was a wimp, just like my dad was, and we started yelling...I don’t remember what else we said, but then he called me a…”

Scooter’s lips clamped shut, and his hands started shaking again. Walter’s heart dropped.

“...You don’t have to say it if you don’t want to. I get it.” And as heartbreaking as it was, Walter did get it- he remembered being called that word before, only once while in high school because he’d made the mistake of showing up in a cardigan, but he remembers the way the air left his body and the feeling of shame biting at his heels, of the ground falling from beneath your feet because you have no idea how to combat what you’ve been called...and what you’re meant to do if the people calling you that are _right._

He couldn’t believe anyone would use such an awful word on someone as awesome as Scooter, couldn’t imagine someone giving him that kind of pain and doubt. Just the thought made his stomach churn.

“...Thanks.” Scooter sniffs a bit, not quite crying but not quite dry-eyed, either. He seemed drained, like it took all the energy he had to speak, and Walter couldn’t blame him one bit for it.

Walter wished he could be more of help to Scooter, wished he could say the right words to make all the hurt go away, but he can’t- he’s never really comforted anyone before besides Gary, nor has he ever really had a friend come to him for advice or to vent, and he wasn’t quite sure what to do in a situation as bad as this one.

With no other ideas, Walter resorts to the only thing he can think of after such a distressing vent session- a hug.

However, the gesture doesn’t work out quite like he planned, as he was left with no other choice but to practically pull his taller friend down by the back of the neck and smash his face into his shoulder. 

There was a beat of silence after this bizarro embrace, Walter desperately hoping that Scooter wasn’t starting to regret coming to him in the first place while Scooter’s face burns bright red, the close contact from his friend catching him completely off guard.

“...Walter?” His voice is half-muffled by Walter’s collar, but there’s clear confusion in his tone...and clear amusement.

“Yes?”

“...Whatcha doin?”

“...It was supposed to be a hug. I couldn’t think of anything else that might make you feel better.” Walter groans. 

Scooter can think of nothing to do but laugh in response, the laugh muffled against fabric and slightly watery in sound, yet no less mirthful. Walter felt himself smiling as well, happy to have made Scooter laugh after the awful night he’d just had (it was, however, no one’s business that Walter’s heart hammered a bit at the sound, as he’d always found Scooter’s loud and breathy chuckles to be adorable).

“If this is how you hug in your family then I don’t think I ever wanna come over for dinner.” Scooter jokes with a little sniffle, voice clearer as he readjusts himself in Walter’s grasp, and Walter laughs along.

“What? You don’t like my stranglehold?” As if emphasizing the word ‘stranglehold’, Walter’s hand slips down as his arm loops around Scooter’s neck. Scooter laughs harder, glad to be seeing Walter’s more playful side and less of the ‘living welcome mat’ aura he usually exudes. 

(Scooter couldn’t bring himself to hug Walter back, both because of his own nervousness and because Walter’s embrace was barely that even in definition, but the gesture melted his heart like caramel. He felt appreciated for once, like someone actually cared...Aside from his mom, his sister, and Kermit, no one had really shown him care in a while, and it felt nice in a way he couldn’t describe- at least not yet.)

They pull apart for a bit, laughter dying down as they do. Scooter wipes a tear out of his eye, though whether that’s from his venting or from the laughter they’d just shared was anyone’s guess, as Walter straightened out his shirt with a giggle.

There’s silence again, but this time it’s a warm silence, one that’s comfortable and easy. One that just doesn’t need any words.

“Well uh…” Scooter says after the warmth ebbs away. “I should get back home...My mom’ll be back by now.”

“You shouldn’t have to go back there after everything he said to you, especially not tonight!” Walter protests with a slight shake of his head, as if the mere idea confounded him. Scooter lets out a sigh, though this one’s more of exhaustion.

“I don’t really have anywhere else to go for the night, Walt. Unless I wanna spend the night in my car, I kinda gotta go.” Understandably, Scooter’s tone is less than thrilled, and he makes no move to get off the couch despite saying that he had to go.

Walter bites his lip, the cogs in his small head turning. After nearly a minute (that Scooter patiently waited out), he speaks.

“You could always stay here for the night, I mean, if you want to.”

Scooter blushes a bit, rubbing the back of his neck.

“Oh, you don’t have to do that. I’ve taken up a lot of your time as it is.” He shook his head, not wanting Walter to have to do more for him than he already has. Walter, however, waves his hand as if it’s of no concern.

“You haven’t, Scooter. I don’t mind listening to you vent, or offering up my couch, if you ever need it.” Walter assures, putting a tentative hand on Scooter’s shoulder. 

“Really?” Scooter finds himself asking, pointedly trying to cover the way he jumped at Walter’s touch. If he was being honest, he wasn’t quite comfortable with people doing this much on his behalf, and he didn’t want to take advantage of Walter’s kindness. However, Walter had seemed genuine enough, and the warm smile he was currently wearing did put Scooter a little more at ease. Plus, it wasn’t as if he actually wanted to go back home.

“Of course,” Walter’s smile widens. “You’re my friend.”

Scooter offers him a smile back, growing quite fond of the warmth Walter exudes. He was glad, at least, that the night had finally brought him something good.

“...Thanks again, Walter. For everything.” He says earnestly.

“Anytime!” Walter affirms with a small shrug of his shoulders, and he pats Scooter’s shoulder exactly 3 times (Scooter counted) before he pulls his hand away.

“So,” The smaller muppet asks after a beat. “Do you wanna go to bed now, or do you feel like staying up for a bit?” Scooter hums, thinking it over.

“Staying up sounds nice. Wanna watch a movie?” He responds, followed by Walter’s enthusiastic smile and a ‘sure!’

“Have you seen ‘Legally Blonde 2’?” Scooter asks.

“No. Have you seen ‘The Princess Bride’?”

“No, not since I was 5.”

“...Rock, Paper, Scissors to see who gets to pick the movie?” Walter suggests with a smirk, one Scooter instantly matches.

“...You’re on. Loser has to buy lunch on Monday.” 

“Deal! You’re _so_ buying me Panera.” Walter grins with a wink, squaring his shoulders as if readying himself for a battle. Scooter laughs with a shake of his head.

The two move closer on the couch, matching smiles on their faces as they began their match. Work would be chaos, as usual, and would possibly go right back to normal for Scooter, but for now that was fine- in the little apartment, sat on a worn couch and watching cheesy romance movies until the wee hours of the morning, was all the solace they needed.


End file.
